


Transitory

by laureltreedaphne



Category: Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-05
Updated: 2014-11-05
Packaged: 2018-02-24 06:28:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2571536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laureltreedaphne/pseuds/laureltreedaphne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Billy's almost memorized the feeling of landing in a plane by now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Transitory

**Author's Note:**

> Migrating fic over from LiveJournal - this is from 2003.

Billy's almost memorized the feeling of landing in a plane by now. There's not much that a pilot can do to surprise him anymore. Sometimes, they'll hit the ground too hard and bounce as the ugly green and black landscape of the runway rushes by outside the oval window, and that'll be unexpected, but not surprising. It'd take a disaster to surprise him by now, and Billy pretends that he doesn't actually hope for one every once in a while to break up the monotony.

The guy next to him unbuckles his seatbelt the moment the plane slows down, and Billy feels secure enough in his knowledge of flying to say, "You're supposed to leave that on until the captain turns off the fasten seatbelt sign." But he doesn't, he stays silent instead, and a few minutes later a flight attendant wearing too much make-up and a pasted on smile comes by to reprimand him quietly. 

None of Billy's items have shifted in the overhead compartment during the flight, since he didn't have anything up there to begin with, so he's able to leave the plane quickly, without having to wait for the idiots who've tried to pass off luggage as carry-on bags to get out of the aisle. He's always liked the tunnel between the plane and the terminal - it's a place of transition, uncertainty, not quite in one place or the other, and Billy likes the way that feels.

When he steps into the terminal, he doesn't even have to look for Orlando, Billy knows that he'll be there, standing by himself in a corner somewhere, wearing sunglasses and pretending to look inconspicuous. In the few seconds it takes for him to shift his bag from his shoulder to the ground, Orlando's beside him, then wrapping his arms around him and squeezing, breathing, "Billy" into the side of his neck. The corner of his sunglasses dig into the flesh of Billy's temple, biting. 

"How was the flight?" Orlando asks, because that's what you always ask when someone's just flown across an ocean to see you, isn't it? "You got in late."

Billy shrugs. "It was fine, nothing surprising. We left the airport a little behind schedule."

"Excuse me," someone says shakily, and they look down to find a girl who can't be older than thirteen staring up at them. "I - I don't want to bother you, but you're Orlando Bloom, aren't you? I'm like, your biggest fan." Orlando smiles down at her and the girl beams back, revealing a row of braces coloured black and orange for Halloween. There's a piece of food stuck in her teeth, and later on she'll see it under the harsh lights of the airport bathroom and cry, because Orlando Bloom saw her like that, and God, why didn't anyone tell her? But for now, she looks like all of her dreams have come true, and Billy thinks that maybe they have, and wishes that his dreams had been that simple when he was thirteen. 

She's wearing a fluorescent pink shirt that hurts Billy's eyes, with a picture of Buddha on it and big black letters declaring, "For good luck, rub my tummy!" Orlando grins and does just that, saying, "I could use a little luck myself, actually," and the girl giggles and looks like she's going to faint, and Billy can picture her at school tomorrow, telling the story to all her friends and being the envy of the seventh grade for about two days. Orlando still hasn't taken his sunglasses off, but he doesn't need to, he's charming enough even without his eyes.

A harried middle-aged woman comes rushing up to them, and Billy knows it's the girl's mother because of the mortified look on her daughter's face. "Lauren!" she says, trying to catch her breath as she speaks, "what have I told you about talking to strangers?" She sends Billy a look of distaste before shackling her hand around the girls arm. 

_"Mom!"_ the girl hisses, sounding close to tears, but Orlando steps in smoothly before she can be embarrassed any further. 

"Oh, we're not strangers, Ma'am," he says, exaggerating his accent and holding out his hand for her to shake. "I'm Orlando Bloom. Lauren and I are old friends. Isn't that right, Lauren," he asks, smiling down at her. The girl turns fifty different shades of red and looks down at her feet as her mother stammers and tries to get her words back. 

"Oh, I'm so sorry," she says, taking his hand and blushing almost as much as her daughter. "I didn't recognize you, with your sunglasses..." 

"It's perfectly fine," he reassures her easily. "It's been great talking to you, Lauren, and I hope you have a good trip, wherever you're going." 

They get away after a few hugs and a picture, and Orlando sweeps Billy's bag off the floor with his hand. "Sorry about that," he says. 

"It's fine," Billy says. "I'm used to it, you know." 

"Right, yeah," says Orlando pushing his sunglasses back up the bridge of his nose. "Let's get out of here."

\---

Orlando's apartment is full of matching colours, soft, but obviously brand new furniture, and top of the line everything. Billy sets his suitcase down on the white carpet and wonders if he needs to take his shoes off before he proceeds any further. 

"I guess you're tired, after the long flight," Orlando says, part questioning, part suggesting. "You want to take a shower, and then, when you're feeling a bit more human again, we can have dinner?" 

Billy wasn't aware that he was feeling like something other than human, but he nods anyway. "Sounds great, yeah."

"Bathroom's down the hall, then. Fresh towels are on the rack, just dump 'em in the hamper when you're through. You can use the stuff that's in there, if you didn't bring your own."

Billy fishes his razor out of his bag, then remembers that it's no use, his blades were confiscated at security, so he asks, "Can I use your razor? If I change the blade, I mean." 

"Yeah, yeah." Orlando's already turned his back on him, wandering towards something in the kitchen. 

Billy steps into the bathroom and locks the door behind him uneasily. He's used Orlando's bathroom before, but that was in New Zealand, before it was made out of gleaming white tiles and chrome and looked like something out of a science fiction movie. It takes him ten minutes to figure out how to turn the shower on, and when he does he makes the water so hot that the steam will make it hard for him to breathe when he gets out, then steps underneath the spray, wincing at the itchy feeling of the water scalding the skin of his back. The little caddy on the wall of the shower is filled with expensive looking bottles of shampoo and conditioner that's made with things like chamomile and wild cherry bark. Billy washes his hair with it and ends up smelling like flowers he's never heard of. 

When he steps out of the shower the wall of the bathroom that's covered with a mirror is completely steamed up. Billy dries himself off, wraps a towel around his waist, and walks over to it. He reaches out a hand and clears away a little area so that he can see his face and stares at it for a while, until his skin starts to prickle with goose bumps. He reaches out again, writes his name in the condensation, then wipes it all away with a swipe of his towel. 

\---

When he walks into the kitchen Keira's there, stealing peppers from a metal bowl sitting on the counter-top and laughing as Orlando tries to steal them back. Neither of them notice him until he clears his throat, and when he does Orlando swings around with his arms around Keira's waist and grins. 

"Hey, Bill. You know Keira, yeah?" 

He doesn't actually, but he nods at her pleasantly anyway. "Yeah, hi." 

"Keira's staying for dinner," says Orlando, biting into a pepper and releasing her. She punches him in the stomach and retreats to the sink. 

"Stop eating those, they're for dinner!" she says in a mock reprimanding voice, and they both grin at each other like she's said something hilarious. "Dinner'll be ready soon, if Orli ever stops disrupting my cooking," she says to Billy once she remembers he's there. "I hope you like pasta and salad, cause that's about all I know how to make."

"That's fine," Billy says. "I'm actually a bit beat, I'm going to go lie down on the couch."

"Yeah," says Orlando, "I guess you're a bit jet-lagged. Remote's on the coffee table, if you want to watch TV."

Billy lies on the soft leather couch silently, listening to them talk and laugh in the kitchen, until Orlando calls him to dinner.

\---

That night, after Keira's gone and the dishes have been cleared, Orlando fucks him into 250 thread count Egyptian-cotton sheets that feel cool against Billy's skin, even though he's flushed and sweating. He's used to Orlando hurting him in bed, Orlando never was quite aware of where he was poking his too sharp elbows, or when he was biting too hard, but now he's carefully controlled, he knows just where to touch and just what to do, and Billy's certainly not complaining.

"I've...missed you, Bill," he pants into Billy's collarbone while he does something with his hand that makes Billy writhe and bite down on his lip. "Things are different, and..."

"Don't..." Billy gasps when Orlando pushes into him and pins his wrists above his head. "Stop talking."

He runs a finger along the thin, raised scar on Orlando's back and Orlando growls, goes too deep too violently too fast. Billy presses his hips up to meet him and traces the scar again, watching as the knuckles of the fingers around his wrist turn white. 

\---

He wakes up in the morning to find the space next to him empty and cool. Orlando's sitting at the breakfast table reading the comics when he comes downstairs, sipping coffee and taking bites out of an apple. 

"Hey," he says over the paper with a smile when he sees Billy. "Tea's over there." He motions towards the counter where there's a mug and a tea bag waiting. Billy fills it with hot water from the kettle on the stove before he joins Orlando at the table. 

"I'm-" Orlando begins and then stops, staring at his paper for a few minutes. "Do you have anything planned for today?" 

"I've got stuff to do, yeah," answers Billy, burning the roof of his mouth with the tea. 

"Yeah, good. I mean, cause I have a bunch of boring stuff to do, meetings, you know."

"Yeah," says Billy. "I know." 

"Tonight, I'm going to a premiere with Keira - I figured you'd be bored, that you'd want to hook up with Lij and Dom maybe? I won't go though, if you don't want me to. Or you can come with us? It's probably going to be boring though, just lots of stuffy Hollywood types." 

Billy thinks _what the fuck are you talking about, I'm a Hollywood type, and when did you start drinking coffee?_

"Yeah," says Billy. "Yeah. I'll give Dom and Lij a call."


End file.
